New Tractor with 12-Valve Cummins and Zero Electronics Goes Back to the Basics

New Tractor with 12-Valve Cummins and Zero Electronics Goes Back to the Basics(thedrive.com)

31 points by pkaeding 27 days ago | 11 comments

slwvx 27 days ago |

I think the idea of an easy-to-service tractor (or other equipment) is much more appealing and important than that it have zero electronics. The article does not focus at all on the "zero electronics" angle, rather on the serviceability of the engine and tractor.

I guess the decision to put "zero electronics" in the title was made by some headline editor who thought it made for more clicks.

anenefan 27 days ago | |

The idea of putting zero electronics was to appeal to those familiar with the many frustrated tractor owners who've got dog tired of POS revenue driven electronics being a necessary part of their more recent purchases. The title to them would indicate it was both not fly by wire as well as an absence of overly complicated control boxes being essential for the machine to work. Obviously the tractor has electrics which includes such things as lights, batteries, alternator and starter motor, and probably basic half century proven basic electronic components such that drives signals and instrumentation.

As a side note, there's not an adequate explanation for what P pumped injector means or its significance. [1]

[1] https://4btengines.com/6bt-vs-isb-comparing-the-p-pumped-12-...

burnt-resistor 27 days ago | |

Vacuum/pneumatic, analog electric, and hydraulic control systems exist and are able to accomplish control functions comparable to proprietary computer-controlled systems with varying degrees of efficiency, accuracy, and precision. The root cause of the situation is greedy corporations who don't want to produce long-lasting, quality products and a lack of appropriate and sensible government regulations to prevent them from exploiting planned obsolescence and price gouging parts and support.

anenefan 27 days ago | | |

Though I'm sure that in many instances a box of tricks that dies is because the 80c capacitor or 2 buck transistor was a few cents cheaper than a better longer life equivalent component, simply the lack of a good long lasting component at a cost effective price is the problem - in my tropical locale, the lack of market presence of a robust switch is a major headache for much of the fly by wire machinery that really needs a better switch when fixing the POS tin plated version that relies of being sealed for it's protection against the elements. Back at least to the 80s, they seemed to have a better regard for what electrochemical potentials of various metals to build robust switches that didn't rely entirely on being sealed ... for example though the old foot dimmers on cars would sometimes give minor trouble, for the most part they worked for a long time in a hostile environment without the need to oil and fuss over them.

metalman 27 days ago |

A note on the 12 valve is that for many years it had NO emmisions equipment as it was so efficient that it met emmisions of the day, "in cylinder", and when tuned properly you can watch the exhaust and it's nothing but heat comming out the stack. also the standard set up will burn almost anything in hard times, and as one pirate I encountered fueling up a p pumped motor with used resuraunt oil said "it will chew through anything including the chicken bones"

this is the kind of reliability that gets smaller scale farms through hard times, especialy where they dont have the excess managerial capacity to navigate the complex systems of government and banking financial "incentives"

silexia 26 days ago |

We need more of this, especially tractors without all the emissions garbage that is just performative nonsense!

defrost 26 days ago | |

It's never to late to read and work through understanding a 1967 classic:

Thermal Equilibrium of the Atmosphere with a Given Distribution of Relative Humidity - https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/atsc/24/3/1520-04...

silexia 24 days ago | | |

It's never to late to read and work through understanding how things work in the real world with actual farmers.

It's never to late to read and work through understanding that the planet is coming off a historic all time low temperature, and as co2 and heat increase, biological life converting it back to oxygen will increase naturally. The system self balances.

exabrial 27 days ago |

Brilliant, now please do cars!

burnt-resistor 27 days ago | |

We should skip ICE and prefer open source, standardized EVs that can be homologated to numerous countries with minimized cost and effort.

Tostino 26 days ago | | |

With battery prices, at this point, it makes no sense to continue investing in ICE technology for consumer vehicles in my opinion. Thank you, China. It could have been the US that brought this tech to market and tried to make it affordable to the masses, but we didn't invest in it.